Syria's fractured opposition seeks elusive unity against Assad

RIYADH, Dec 8 (Reuters) - Syria's divided rebel and
opposition groups are trying to forge a common stance to oust
President Bashar al-Assad but the absence of prominent activists
and a main Kurdish force from their talks in Riyadh shows that
unity remains elusive.

Saudi Arabia, a strong supporter of rebels fighting for four
years to topple Assad, is hosting the opposition this week in
the most ambitious attempt yet to find an agreed platform ahead
of talks with the government to end Syria's conflict.

Bringing the fragmented opposition together is seen by its
backers as a crucial step to end a civil war which started with
protests against Assad in 2011 and quickly drew in rival Sunni
and Shi'ite Muslim powers across the Middle East.

Shi'ite Iran, Assad's main regional supporter, has
criticised the meeting in the Sunni Muslim kingdom, saying it is
designed to harm efforts to reach a peaceful solution to a war
which has killed 250,000 people and displaced 12 million.

At a Riyadh hotel where the talks will start on Wednesday,
security was stepped up and journalists were ejected as fighters
and opposition leaders gathered. Special forces soldiers with
body armour and assault rifles manned checkpoints.

An initial list of 65 invitees to the Riyadh talks has grown
substantially, but critics say it still falls short of a fully
inclusive meeting.

The Kurdish administration that runs swathes of north Syria
was not invited. Rebels in western Syria do not trust the main
Kurdish militia, the YPG, because they say it cooperates with
Damascus rather than fighting it.

"SAUDI-TURKISH WISH-LIST"

"It is not all-encompassing. It is not the consolidated,
overall opposition platform," a Western diplomat following Syria
said of the Saudi meeting. "I do not expect Riyadh to be a
constructive step ... The whole thing has been very acrimonious,
and it looks like a Saudi-Turkish wish-list."

Alongside Saudi Arabia, Turkey is one of the main foreign
backers of the rebellion against Assad.

Syrian Kurdish, Arab and Turkmen groups held their own
opposition conference in the Kurdish-controlled town of
al-Malikiya at the Syrian-Iraqi border on Tuesday.

Haytham Manna, an activist in exile, said he would not
attend the Riyadh meeting because it included "people who
support an Islamic emirate".

With Iran decrying the meeting as harmful to peace prospects
and Western countries concerned by the role that Islamists will
play, Saudi Arabia may struggle to unite the enemies of Assad.

For Saudi Arabia, Syria has been secondary to Yemen this
year as the main cockpit in an overarching struggle for regional
influence with Iran, but the ruling Al Saud continue to regard
the Syrian civil war as a pivotal battlefield in the rivalry.

Fighting has escalated in Syria in recent weeks and Russian
warplanes have intervened to support Damascus while a U.S.-led
coalition has stepped up strikes against Islamic State targets
from the crowded skies over the country.

BLOODSHED, REFUGEES AND ATTACKS

Increased bloodshed, an influx of Syrian refugees into
Europe, and a wave of international attacks claimed by Islamic
State revived international efforts to contain the violence.

"This is the first meeting where we have all the opposition,
the politicians and the armed groups," said Hadi al-Bahra, a
member of the Turkey-based SNC opposition coalition.

Those talks should start by Jan. 1, under the terms of an
agreement reached by world powers and regional states at a
meeting in Vienna a month ago.

Participants invited to the Riyadh meeting include Islamist
factions Islam Army and Ahrar al-Sham, a group whose founders
had links to al Qaeda. Ahrar al-Sham fights alongside the Nusra
Front, al Qaeda's Syrian wing, while espousing a nationalist
agenda.

A dozen rebel groups who fight under the banner of the Free
Syrian Army are also due to attend, including groups vetted by
the United States that have received foreign military aid.

Of the two most powerful armed groups in Syria, Islamic
State has not been invited and the al Qaeda offshoot Nusra Front
is also not expected.

National Coalition member Nagham al-Ghadri said the two-day
meeting aimed to agree on a document to take to any talks with
the Damascus government, as well as an agreed negotiating team.

She said the opposition would not back down from its demand
that Assad step down as soon as a transitional ruling body -
which an international meeting on Syria called for three years
ago - is established.

"The minute the transitional period should start, he should
leave. We don't agree that he could stay during the transitional
period," Ghadri said.

The Syrian government has dismissed any talk of a
transitional body being imposed in Syria, saying any change in
power in Damascus must be decided by the Syrian people.

Some Western countries which called for Assad to step aside
in 2011 have softened their demands, suggesting he could at
least remain for an interim period.

Ghadri said the outside world was sending mixed messages
over Syria, showing that international divisions ran even deeper
than any splits in the Syrian opposition.

"It's not just us. We know what we want," she said. "Some
countries don't know what they want from Syria."
(Additional reporting by Tom Perry and Sylvia Westall in
Beirut, and Suleiman al-Khalid in Amman; Writing by Dominic
Evans, editing by Sami Aboudi and Peter Millership)